Japanese whaling fleet loses in court, at sea

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JAPAN'S whaling has suffered a double blow  being found
illegal by an Australian court and with its fleet in turmoil under
environmentalist attack.

The Federal Court decision raised pressure for the Rudd
Government to act against the whalers if they continue to hunt in
an Australian Whale Sanctuary in the Antarctic.

The fleet's chaser boats were on the run last night after Sea
Shepherd broke up their attempt to resupply in the Southern Ocean,
far south-west of Australia.

In the action, the Japanese detained two Sea Shepherd activists,
one of them Australian, who in an unprecedented act, boarded a
moving whaling catcher boat in the icy Antarctic.

The two activists were being held under guard in a locked room
aboard the whale catcher boat Yushin Maru No. 2 last night,
according to Glenn Inwood, a spokesman for Japan's Institute of
Cetacean Research.

"This is clearly an act of piracy," Mr Inwood said. "You can't
just go and board vessels that are acting legally."

Sea Shepherd said the men were being held hostage and the
Australian Federal Police had been notified.

Meanwhile, Greenpeace continued to chase the factory ship
Nisshin Maru away from the whaling grounds, some days' sailing from
the rest of the fleet.

The persistence of the direct actions, combined with the
political weight of the court decision and the imminent arrival of
Oceanic Viking, the Customs patrol ship sent south to watch the
whalers, calls into question future whaling by Japan this
summer.

Attorney-General Robert McClelland, last night ruled out the use
of Oceanic Viking to stop the hunt, because it would put lives at
risk.

"More than that, to ultimately end whaling is to win the
co-operation of the Japanese," he said. "I think that strategy
would result in the boomerang effect, that is actually entrench
stronger opposition rather than induce a change of approach."

The Japanese Government has already ordered the whalers to
shelve their plans to take humpbacks, in a deal reached with the US
under Australian pressure.

The Federal Opposition called on Prime Minister Kevin Rudd to
become personally involved. Environment Minister Peter Garrett
declined to comment. Before the election, Mr Garrett had said Labor
would enforce the law banning whale slaughter in the Australian
Whale Sanctuary.

Animal welfare group Humane Society International said Oceanic
Viking should be used to stop whaling.

But Don Rothwell, professor of international law at Australian
National University, said such action would be "foolish and
counterproductive".

"It would be seen as very provocative, not just by Japan but by
the rest of the Antarctic Treaty parties," he said.

The court's decision to rule the whaling illegal under the
Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act follows a
long struggle by Humane Society International.

The group pushed on with the cause when the Howard government
rejected it as politically damaging and futile because Japan did
not recognise Australian jurisdiction in the case.

Japan does not recognise Australia's territorial claim in the
Antarctic, and nor did its whaling company acknowledge the legal
action. Despite this, Justice James Allsop ordered that whaling
company Kyodo Senpaku Kaisha be restrained from killing, injuring,
taking or interfering with any minke, fin, or humpback whale in the
sanctuary.